He peaked late. Plus, as soon as he did, the Fed began screwing him over.

So why are you suggesting the Fed continues to screw over it's skaters? They were wrong to do it to Gatchinski, wrong to do it to Menshov, and it would be wrong and more importantly STUPID AND DAMAGING to do it to Kovtun now. Kovtun did not send himself to Worlds, nor Euros. Voronov skated well at Worlds last season and wound up 17th due to the depth of the field and poor PCS, then he didn't do well at Euros and Kovtun beat him, so it makes sense not to send Voronov, and if Voronov is good enough to beat Menshov at Nationals then it's really not that crazy how the fed wound up deciding to send Kovtun to Worlds (though he probably should have competed at the Russian Cup event first). What really should have happened was Menshov, Voronov, and Kovtun going to Euros as a skate off and the highest placed one goes to Worlds - Plushy ended up withdrawing anyways, had he been honest about his condition he would have not competed at all knowing it was unwise and he was hurt. The fed took a gamble deciding to send Kovtun over Menshov and so far it paid off at Euros but hasn't thus far at Worlds - that's it, arguably not the right call but it's a gamble either way. Tanking at Worlds is going to look worse for Menshov than it will for Kovtun anyways, in some respects, the Fed is saving Menshov from potential embarassment.